Attic Conversion Phase 2

Attention was then turned to upstairs. Much work had already been done but due to tricky access prior to the stairs the number of photos reduced. Now is the time for the room itself to take shape.
The above photo I am stood in the attic, the doorway is where the black water tank was in yesterdays post. The frame for the door and walls at the top of the stairs has been started.


This photo shows part of the frame for the new wall and you can just about see the new slimmer water tank behind the wall which will be boxed in with a door for access. The photo next to it is on the other side of the door and you can see a part of one of the storage hatches which is where the christmas tree etc will end up. I have never seen how a wall is constructed before and it was amazing how quickly this went up. All of a sudden everything started to look like a room. There are velux windows in the ceiling but getting these on camera was tricky but will see if Hubby has any photos on his phone.

The new stairs were also boxed in which has left us with an unusal shape but we needed to make sure that there was plenty of headroom coming up the stairs below and anyway it is growing on us and the 'odd' shape sort of fits in with our family!
Plaster board has been added and you can see the base of the stairs. We like open ballistrading as it gives the feeling of open space, but there is quite alot of it to now paint!
The white section was already there and we have been able to match in the old with the new. More tomorrow once I have tracked down the photos as we seem to have them stored in three different places.


WIP progress:

I have finally finished all of the squares for Sophie's quilt and tonight I am going to start cutting up strips ready to sew it together at my sewing club on Wednesday. I am getting quite excited about this one and this quilt has gone together much faster than I thought it would. Today I have also been tinkering with my Etsy shop and added some book covers. I really like them but I will be pleased when they go to a new home as they will get loveingly used. I even braved it and had a little go at my website. I have added a new section and deleted some that I have changed my mind on. More on that tomorrow once I have downloaded some more photos. Plus a feature on one of my blog friends.
Enjoy the evening, a DVD and some wine with a little sewing I think for me.
LOL
XX

Attic Conversion Phase 1..

The day after the Easter weekend, Tuesday, and the first day of my much needed Easter holiday instead of getting the lie in I was looking forward to I had to get up at 6.30am and be presentable for the when the builders would arrive to start the conversion. During the weekend Hubby and I had been emptying the attic and airng cupboard, much of Sophie's room and the garage to put into storage.

Now, we live in a link detached 1970's house and due to the housing climate we can not afford to move and we have rather out-grown our house. There no spare room for visitors etc and it was cheaper to convert the attic.

The idea was to use some of the space above the existing stairs to gain acess to the attic.

So, the above photo shows me standing at the top of the stairs looking back along the landing. The white wall on the left as you look at the picture is the airing/linen cupboard that also contained the hot water tank.

This picture shows the door to the airing cupboard. The light above is the access hatch to the attic. Can you guess where the stairs are going to go? It was very difficult for us to imagine that my little old cupboard would be big enough to give us adequate room for stairs!

This picture shows the emtpy attic complete with TV arial and roof struts which will have to be removed and strengthening girders of steel put in so that the whole roof does not collaspe. Crikey, did we really think carefully about this?

This is the other end of the attic and on the floor you can see the attic hatch. The black thing in the picture is the cold and hot water tank which will need to be upgraded and moved.

At this point we both found it very hard to believe that this would work. We trusted the builder and the fact that he had completed many conversions.

Remember the airing cupboard door? Well there are now stairs there. We both thought that this was very clever. They are only slightly narrower than standard stairs with the same rise height. They were made in London and delivered to Cornwall in a couple of bits. We are very pleased with them. Before that, the only way to see the work in the attic was to climb up a ladder which at one point was over the existing stairs! There are no photos of that stage as there was not much to see and it was very difficult to see due to no light of any kind.

End of installment 1.

Sophie's quilt is coming along nicely and I am now going to do some more and should have some WIP pictures for you tomorrow.

Best wishes.

XX